Hoisting-machine



L Patented Sept. 27, I898. H. c. BEHR & R. E. BROWNE.

HUISTING MACHINE.

(Application filed Sept. 20, 1897.) (No Model.) 2 Sheets-Sheet I.

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N0. 6ll,3|l. Patented Sept. 27, I898. H. C. BEHR & R. E. BROWNE.

HOISTING MACHINE.

(Application filed Sept. 20, 1897 2 Sheets8heet 2.

(No Model.)

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UNITED STATES PATENT FFICE.

HANS BEIIR AND ROSS E. BROWVNE, OF SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA.

HOISTING- SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 61 1,311, dated September 27, 1898. Application filed September 20, 1897. Serial No. 652,220. (No model.)

To to whom it may concern.-

Be it known that we, HANS C. BEHR and ROSS E. BROWNE, citizens of the United States, residing in the city and county of San Francisco and State of California, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Hoisting-Machines; and we do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, and exact description of the same.

Our invention relates to hoisiting machinery-such, for example, as is employed in mines to raise loads from shafts or inclines. In machines of this character round ropes, windingin a single layer on cylindrical drums, are used. This single-layer winding is found to be the best plan in that wear and tear of the rope is reduced; but it is attendant with a decided drawback, growing out of the necessity of increasing the winding-surface of the drum to accommodate the single-winding rope. Heretofore this increase has taken place upon two linesnamely, either by making the drum longer or by making it of larger diameter. The objection, on the one hand, to the long drum (and where the length of the rope is great, as in deep mines, the drum must necessarily be very long) is the decided deviation where the customary disposition of the drum relatively to the shaft is followed of the rope-lead from the pit-head sheave, over which it passes from the shaft to the winding-drum, while, on the other hand, the difficulty found with the drum of large diameter is the correspondingly large driving-engines or expensive or otherwise objectionable intermediate gearing required to operate it.

The main object we contemplate by ourinvention is the ability to use drums of smaller diameter, thereby increasing the number of revolutions for a given hoisting speed, and consequently reducing the size of the engine required to operate the drum, and at the same time we avoid the objection to the necessarily long drums by an'arrangement of parts and construction of devices which in most, cases will entirely correct and under all circumstances will relieve the deviation of the rope-lead from the pit-head sheave, thereby saving wear and tear of said rope.

Another object is to maintain the direction of strain on the gallows -frame above the mouth of the shaft more nearly in the same or approximately so, to the plane of rotation of said overhead or pit-head sheave, a rope leading from the load over said sheave to the Winding-drum, and a guide-sheave to receive the rope from the pit-head sheave, said guidesheave being located above the winding-drum, with its rope-leadin g face in the vertical plane of the winding side thereof, whereby it directs the rope straight to said drum, and suit able means for effecting the travel of said guide-sheave to traverse the drum in a direction to keep its rope-leading face in the said vertical plane of the winding side of the drum, so as to properly lead the rope to wind spirally on or off the drum in accordance with the required spacing or pitch of the winding, all as we shall hereinafter more fully describe by reference to the accompanying drawings, in which Figures 1, 2, and 3 are front and side elevations and plans, respectively, of a hoisting mechanism embodying our invention in its application to a single cylindrical drum. Fig. 4 shows in plan our invention as applied to a conical drum. Fig. 5 is a View showing the customary disposition of the drum relatively to the shaft and the pit-head sheave as at present in use.

Before entering upon the detailed description of our invention we deem it best to call attention to Fig. 5 as illustrating the present arrangement of hoist and the difficulties attendant upon it and which we seek to overcome. I

A is the shaft of a mine or deep well or such like bore of underground Work. Above this is the usual pit-head sheave I), over which the hoisting-rope E passes from the shaft and down to the hoisting or winding drum C. In this customary arrangement the axis of the drum C is at right angles to a plane passing from the side of the drum through or near the shaft A, and this results in a deviation of the rope-lead from the pit-head sheave to the drum. The extremes of deviation of the rope from the direct course favorable for winding properly onto the drum are well illustrated in Fig. 5. Now, as before stated, if the drum be made of large diameter to correct this deviation and provide sufficient extent of surface to receive a long rope wound in a single layer it will require a larger engine or otherwise objectionable gearing to operate it, and if the drum be made of small diameter to avoid the use of such large engine or gearing it must be made long to furnish winding-surface to receive the rope, and in this case the deviation of the rope becomes excessive. IVith this illustrated repetition of the difficulties to be overcome we shall now proceed to an explanation of Figs. 1, 2, 3, and 4 as embodying our invention.

A is the shaft, over the mouth of which is the gallows-frame B, having at its top the usual pit-head sheave b.

O is the Winding or hoisting drum, mounted upon suitable supports 6. Above this drum is a guide-sheave D,which directs the ropeE to the drum, said rope being the hoisting-r0pe, leading up from the shaft and over the pithead sheave b down to the guide-sheave D.

The relative arrangement of the guidesheave and the hoisting-drum is such that the former is above the latter, as shown in Figs. 1 and 2, and the rope-lead face of said guidesheave is in the perpendicular or vertical plane of the winding side of the drum, as shown by Figs. 2 and 3, whereby the rope E is led down straight to said drum. In the present instance in order to gain these relative positions the axis 0 of the drum points toward the shaft A, so that said axis is parallel, or approximately so, to the plane of rotation of the overhead or pit-head sheave b, and the axis cl of the guide-sheave is in a plane at right angles to that of the drum, and the whole sheave lies in the vertical plane of the winding side of said drum, said sheave thus rotating in the same, or approximately the same, plane as the vertical sag of the rope.

The sheave D is capable of having a traveling movement imparted to it, so that it may traverse the drum and lay up or lay off the rope as required. For this purpose we show the sheave mounted in a frame or carriage d, having rollers d traveling on tracks d carried on the cross-timbers d of the frame-columns d having a brace d to take up the strain in the direction of the shaft. The carriage cl may, if desired, be mounted to have a sliding movement instead of a rolling one; but in any case the direction of travel is in the vertical plane of the winding side of the drum perpendicularly beneath. As the rope winds on or 01f the drum in a spiral the sheave is moved along in its carriage-frame by any suitable mechanism in a manner to correspond with the course of the point of winding on or off along the side of the drum, the edge or rope-lead face of the sheave directing the rope to the drum being maintained vertically over this point.

The mechanism for traversing the sheave carriage need in general only be capable of exerting a force and movement in the direction away from the pit-head sheave and hoisting-shaft, the return movement being accomplished by the pull of the hoisting-rope, due to the suspended load in or above the shaft, the traversing mechanism then only controlling the movement by the amount it re-. leases the carriage in proportion to the revolution of the drum. In applying a traversing mechanism of this kind it is best to have one dependent for its operation on the rotation of the drum itself, thereby rendering it fully automatic, and with this in view we illustrate such a device, in which F is a small chain-drum fixed on a shaft f, mounted in suitable bearings f on the columns (F. This shaft is rotated by means of aworm-wheel G, which it carries, said worm wheel being driven by a worm c on the axis or shaft 0 of hoisting drum 0. The movement of the sheave-carriage d is effected by a chain II, wound on the small drum F, passing upward over a small guide-pulley h, and thence horizontally to the sheave-carriage, to which it is fastened, as shown. The dotted circles show the extreme positions of the guidesheave D. As the chain II. is wound on the small drum F the sheave D, with its carriage, is drawn back away from the hoisting-shaft A. hen the chain unwinds, the carriage is moved in the opposite direction by the pull of the hoisting-rope E taking up the slack of the chain as it is paid out.

In cases where the load is nearly all taken off the end of the rope when it comes to the surface the pull on the rope will not be sufficient to bring back the carriage in the manner just described. In such cases the carriage can be pulled back by means of another chain-gear similar to the one described and illustrated, but located at the opposite end of the drum, or a simple counterbalanceweight W, Fig. 1, attached to the carriage by means of a rope or chain w, may be employed to attain the same object. Traversing mechanisms of other constructions may be usedsuoh, for example, as a screw driven by wheel or chain gearingor other means which will readily suggest them selves may be adapted to properly move the carriage, though we regard the mechanism here shown as being simple and automatic and capable of effecting the result to an advantage.

In hoisting from great depths the drums are frequently made conical in shape, so that when the load is at the bottom of the shaft and the weight of rope, as Well as that of the load, has to be lifted the leverage is at the smaller radius, while when the load is at the surface and no weight of rope is to be lifted the leverage is at the larger end of the drum. In this manner a compensation is effected and the resistance to be overcome by the hoisting-engine becomes much more uniform than with a cylindrical drum. Fig. t shows in plan the arrangement as applied to a hoist with conical drum. Here the guide-sheave carriage 01 must be made to traverse obliquely to the direction of the hoisting-rope E on account of the slanting side of the hoistingdrum 0.

The effect when the drum is located as shown in Fig. 4, with its axis pointing exactlytoward the shaft A, is to bring about a slight lateral deviation of the rope from its most advantageous position in the exact plane of the pit-head sheave. The dotted positions of the guide-sheave over the drum indicate the extent of the deviation, which is, however, very slight when compared with that required for a long drum located, as is at present the custom, as shown in Fig. 5- that is to say, with the axis of the hoistingdrum extendingin a plane at right angles to a plane drawn from the drum side to the hoisting-shaft. In this customary disposition of the drum it is evident that great lateral deviation of the rope must take place as it winds from one end to the other of a long drum, resulting in great wear and tear on the rope. In our invention, however, with cylindrical drums disposed, as we have illustrated in Figs. 1, 2, and 8, there is no lateral deviation of the rope, and consequently no wear or tear from that cause, and at the same time it is possible to use as long a drum of small diameter as may be found advantageous for the reasons we have hereinbefore pointed out. Even in the use of a conical drum, as in Fig. 4, we reduce the lateral deviation to a minimum. Though we have herein illus trated our invention as embodied in hoistingmachines employing a single drum and rope, it is evident that it may be applied equally well to a double hoisting plant for a two-compartment shaft.

I Traversing guide-sheaves in pairs have been used to lay a rope on the drum. The necessity for the pair lies in the arrangement of the drum relatively to the line of the ropelead thereto, being one in which the drumaxis lies at right angles to and is divided centrally by said rope-lead, and therefore requiring two sheaves to control the lateral strain or deviation of the rope and also to lead the rope in multiple layers on the drum, as is the intention in the usual hoisting apparatus and in spinning and spool-winding devices. Such sheaves, moreover, are necessarily affected bythe vertical swaying or sagging of the hoisting-rope, which thereby presses and rubs either against the upper or lower sheave flanges, causing much wear of the rope and flanges. In the arrangement we have described as constituting our invention the swaying or sagging of the hoistingrobe does not cause rubbing against the flanges, as the sheave is rotated in the same plane as the vertical sag of the rope.

Having thus described our invention, what we claim as new, and desire to obtain by Letters Patent, is

1. A hoisting machine or mechanism, com prising an overhead sheave, a hoisting or winding drum having its axis parallel or approximately so, to the plane of rotation of said overhead sheave, a hoisting-rope leading from the load over said overhead sheave to the winding-drum, a guide-sheave interposed in the course of said rope, said sheave being above the winding-drum with its rope-leading face in the vertical plane of the winding side of said drum, and means for effecting the travel of said guide-sheave, to cause it to traverse the drum in a line to keep its ropeleading face in the said vertical plane of the winding side of said drum.

2. A hoisting machine or mechanism, comprising an overhead directing-sheave, a Winding or hoisting drum having its axis parallel or approximately so, to the plane of rotation of said overhead sheave, a hoisting-rope leading from the load over the overhead sheave to the winding-drum, a guide-sheave interand lying above the winding-drum with its rope-leading face in the vertical plane of the winding side of said drum, and means for effecting the travel of said guide-sheave, to cause it to traverse the drum in a line to keep its rope-leading face in the said vertical plane of the winding side of said drum.

3. In a hoisting machine or mechanism, equipped with a winding or hoisting drum, a hoisting-rope and a sheave, such as a pithead sheave, interposed to direct the rope from the load to the drum, a guide-sheave located above the winding or hoisting drum with its rope-leadin g face in the vertical plane of the winding side of said drum, and a traversing mechanism comprising a carriage on which the guide-sheave is mounted, said carriage being mounted to have a movement in a line parallel with the winding side of the drum, a small winding-drum, a line from said drum to the carriage, and gearing for operating the small winding-drum from the main hoisting-drum.

In witness whereof we have hereunto set our hands.

HANS o. BEHR. ROSS E. BROWNE.

Witnesses:

HOLLAND SMITH, WALTER F. VANE.

Ioo 

